So, I was thinking of posting about this track, “When The Swifts Come Home”, from the upcoming Tenement Halls record, Knitting Needles & Bicycle Bells (out next week on Merge), and then I came across this Tenement Halls bio written by Dan Bejar, wherein he urges the reader to go listen to “When The Swifts Come Home”, and suddenly, I was absolutely positive that I should post about the track. So here goes:

Go listen to this track from the upcoming Tenement Halls record. It’s good. Really good.

::: When The Swifts Come Home :::

Thanks to everyone’s who’s signed up for the Catbird Records List; one day soon, you’ll receive a dazzling plain-text email message.

Subpop‘s streaming the new Holopaw record here. Hey, Pitchfork gave it an 8.4, you know.

I really love this track by Swede-heart Magnus Larsson, aka Pet Politics. Major thanks to Popsheep for posting this one.

::: In My Head :::

A lot of people are pointing out that you can download the track “7/4″ from the new Broken Social Scene record over at Gallery AC dot com. S’alright, if you want my opinion.

Over at one of kaleb‘s myriad domains, pissyeller.org, there’s an mp3 from the upcoming Rosebuds full-length, Birds Make Good Neighbors. It’s a pretty different sound from their prior stuff, go check it out.

Hey, it’s Friday, what the hell…why not pop over to Buddyhead ‘s MP3 blog, Medication, and check out the 1981 demo version of the Misfits’ “Archangel”. C’mon, throw Danzig a bone.

It’s a long story, but I sort of just accidentally stumbled across Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin back in the middle of May. Once I got their disc, Broom, I couldn’t stop listening to it, and once I posted about them, there’s been no shortage of people writing me emails telling me how much they, too, love the SSLYBY disc.

What’s so amazing is that now, it’s not even 3 months later, and Broom has reached at least as high as #54 on the CMJ charts, *and* they’re getting a review in the October issue of SPIN, *and* they’re being featured on NPR’s All Songs Considered today, *and*, to top it all off, they also graciously agreed to be part of this little project called Catbird Records, which will see its inaugural release, a split disc between SSLYBY and the incredibly-talented Michael Holt, formerly of the Mommyheads, next month.

The weird bit of synchronicity here is that although I’ve been the gatekeeper over at Mommyheads dot com for years now, it was also only back in early May that I finally got in contact with Michael. So, I basically met both SSLYBY and Michael at about the same time, totally independent of one another, and then discovered that, oddly, they too had just met, and were planning to work on a project together. And I’m honored and delighted that they’ve let me be a part of it.

Go here and sign-up for the mailing list if you want to be in on the Catbird Records news announcements and whatnot.

I know, “people gotta make a living” and “business is business” and etc. etc. I’m not passing judgement here, just relaying an FYI: Absolutely Kosher, Hush, Spinart, Lookout, Taang!, and a number of other labels have just recently shown up as new members on the RIAA Membership List.

The Unbunny Cross-Country Drive Slide Show is up. Thrill to the dazzling sight of Jarid sitting in my incredibly poorly-lit backyard.

Vanderslice‘s Pixel Revolt is now available for pre-ords over at Barsuk. I don’t know how many times I gotta say it, but it’s a good ‘un. They’ve also just posted my favorite track from the disc, “Exodus Damage”. The disc is officially out on the 23rd.

Its Meaningless dot com: Lys Guillorn- “You Love To Fail” and Guantanamo Bay City Rollers (nice! – ed.) – “You and Me and The Moon”

Got a nice care package recently from Sleepsound Records, including the latest from Armored Frog and Testface (which was just reviewed by kaleb over at sctas). Go poke around the Sleepsound site, there are plenty of sample mp3s to be had.

Oh, and that new Doveman record, too, you heard that one? Luuuurrrrvvely…

Oh also, a copy of the latest Asobi Seksu disc (the s/t one; yeah, I know it’s not technically “new”) showed up recently too, which I was quite thankful for,
being that I’m a sucker for semi-precious Japanese vocals**. They’ve got quite a few mp3s for
you right here.

**seriously, you should’ve seen how pissed I was to get shut out of that
Petty Booka show that one time.

Sub Pop‘s thrown up a few new mp3s, one from Rogue Wave‘s Descended Like Vultures, out in October, and (my favorite) one from their re-release of Chad VanGaalen‘s Infiniheart (out later this month), which to my ears also sounds like it’s been remastered.

::: Rogue Wave – 10:1 :::
::: Chad VanGaalen – Clinically Dead :::

And, first I’ve heard of this one: Baskerville’s Syndrome says that on August 17th, Barsuk is releasing a Vanderslice “Best Of”, called Five Years: Selected Recordings 2000-2005. Update: Daniel kindly sent me notice that this is a UK/Australia-only release.

The Parasol/Hidden Agenda release of Jose Gonzalez‘s excellent album Veneer is now available. I quite like it, you know.

::: Jose Gonzalez – Stay In The Shade :::

Note: Almost exactly one year ago (minus a day), I posted this exact same
track. That’s a little bit weird.

Week 5 at It’s Meaningless Dot Com. This week, it’s Jens Kutilek‘s bloopy take on “Acoustic Guitar”, and Get Him Eat Him‘s awesome cover of “The Luckiest Guy on the Lower East Side”.

Joey TTWS tipped us off to this mash-up that is probably of quasi-interest even to those outside the Philly scene: The Capitol Years Vs. Mazarin: “Juicer’s Apathy”.

And Greg (not Dulli) sent over a note telling me to check out Moon Maan, ex-Afghan Whig Rick McCollum’s band. It’s pretty decent stuff, and is actually pretty damn Whigsy. Did I really just say “Whigsy”?

::: Moon Maan – Light Of The Moon :::

Wow, is it August already? Cripes. Well anyway, that means a new mix is up. Thanks go over to Jeff over at Keep Recordings, who not only turned in a really nice-looking banner, but also completed it in less than 30 minutes, which is a new record. You may recognize Keep as the home of BMR, but there’s a whole host of other good artists on Keep to check out too. Swing by their Audio page and see if anything rubs you the right way.

Also, I found a quick and easy way to concatenate mp3s using the OS X Terminal, so guess what, the mix is also available now in Podcast format, aka “One Big Mp3″. I still don’t understand why anyone would want it in this format (and yes, I’ve heard all the reasonings), but there it is. If you want that feed-type thing to type into iTunes or whatever, it’s:

feeds.feedburner.com/catbirdseatpodcast